It was June 26, the MSOLA community, like all the parishioners of Saint Jean-Baptiste de Sceaux, was invited to the big annual end-of-year party. It was for Agnès Nouyrigat, the occasion of a beautiful meeting.
Our church being too small to contain all the parishioners, a large tent was erected by municipal employees in the garden of the Menagerie, which allowed everyone to participate in the Eucharistic celebration.
The choir, accompanied by several instruments was able to motivate the assembly, with well-chosen and catchy songs.
The celebration ended with the blessing of the families. I must say that this gesture for the families particularly moved me. It was touching to see coming before the priest: fathers, mothers and children, several kneeling to receive the blessing, then putting into a basket a prayer intention written by the family.
An aperitif taken on the spot, still under the tent, allowed people to greet and exchange with one another.
As for the meal shared around large tables, it gave me the opportunity to meet a 12-year-old girl who had come with her grandmother. During the meal, the sheet with the text of the prayer of blessing was given to those who wanted it, with the proposal to go and gather in a small tent built nearby. The grandmother took this sheet. Immediately, the girl asked her for it and said: “I want to go and pray, but what am I going to say, because I don’t know how to pray? Having overheard the conversation, I said to her: “You are going to recite a ‘Hail Mary’”. – “I don’t know…” she answered. So, the idea came to me to cut out from my “Magnificat”, the prayer of the Our Father. I gave it to her and she went to pray with it… Shortly after, she came back very happy, and said to me: “I have read the whole blessing sheet”. It was her prayer! A little later, I found the grandmother who thanked me for the gesture I made to her granddaughter. Because, she told me with sadness, this child has received no religious education.
I think that this meeting illustrates well the thought of Pope Francis, about the importance of the transmission of the faith by grandmothers!
Agnes Nouyrigat
